Saturday, November 27, 2010

i finally did it. after years of coveting back issues at my local library, i have finally subscribed to Mother Earth News. i'll have copies of my very own to love and pet and call them George. (and if you dont get that refrence read Of Mice And Men. now. seriously, put down the mouse and go to the bookstore)

i have wanted to subscribe for years, but for one reason or another (finances, mocking by exhusband, you know the usual) i never did it. ive always scooped them up when i found them at the library, but never fully committed. but now there mine mine mine.

and,yes, im getting very squee over a magazine subscription. i know this. but if you think thats bad, you should have been here when i got new laundry baskets!

Sunday, November 21, 2010

im going to preface this with a little background info for those that dont know it already. i work at my local 911. i hear the best and absolute worst that society can dish up. it takes a certian kind of detatchment to be able to do this for any legnth of time. ive been doing it for 9 years now. so this post is a bit... personal, without being specific.

there is a HUGE problem in society today. and it gets worse and worse every day.

people are expectted to behave within socially acceptable boundries called 'normal'. and there expected to do it every day. as a society we put on our cookie cutter suits, go to our cookie cutter jobs, come home to our cookie cutter houses and families. we are taught to never stand out. never be different. and its killing us. i take calls every day from teens acting out, family screaming matches, wives looking for husbands that dissappeared with the contents of the bank account. all because we have shackled ourselves, created a prison that we cant seem to shake.

when was the last time you were happy?
the last time you just let go and went crazy?
think the two might be related?

the little boxes we have forced ourselves into are killing us. rotting us from the inside out. and its all because we dont let ourselves just... be. i hear countless times a day, both in work amd out, from people that they would "lov to do x" but their wife/husband/boss/neighbors/insert authority figure here "just wouldnt understand"

when did we make other people the authority over us? when did it become ok to give away that much power?

in our house, going crazy is a pretty routine thing. we encourage it. we feed it. because we understand that going crazy is nessiassairy and, dare i say it, healthy.

on any given day in our house you will see a room covered in star wars toys, 2 complete ghostbusters costumes, mideval bannars, a minni quidditch pitch, flying broom, star wars costumes, pirate costumes, ill run out of room if i try to list everything. hubby wants to play paintball? go for it. world war 2 reenactment? enjoy. i decide to drop everything and spray paint the front door bright green and put on a door knocker of thor? good on ya.

hubby and i, both working at the same place, understand the importance of going crazy. i LOVE when hubby goes crazy. because i know he wont be draining our bank account for a weekend in vegas without telling me. and he knows the same about me. all because we give each other the freedom to go a little insane every once in a while. so please people, for the good of the world, go...

Friday, November 19, 2010

so yeah, its been a couple days. ive been away from the computer. mainly because ive been upchucking. yes, thats right the flu has hit the vnh household.

first it was bubby. poor boy, hed never thrown up before. he didnt know what was going on. he was so scared. a call to the doctor and a jug of pedialyte later and hes just fine, though a bit more cuddlly than usual. im ok with that though.

then... me. it started at 3am, and got steadly worse untill i came face to face with the tacos i had for dinner the night before. yum. not so much. but im on the mend, and even back to work. though im still convinced id make a better thhm than i do a work out of the house mom. but thats for another time...

and just as i am getting better, i get a call from the princess other nana saying that she had to be picked up from school because she threw up before lunch. my poor baby. i knew shed had a bad cold, shed been coughing for a week. her bio mom has been sending her to us with a slew of otc meds. but i was hoping that this flu would pass her by. * she should be in the pink in a day or so.

but now that everything is (for the most part) back to normal, the blogs should be rolling out again.

of course now that ive said that ill probably get typhoid or something.

* this was going to be a huge rant about how over the counter meds dont really HEAL you, they just make you FEEL better. but i decided it wasnt worth the fight that might ensue. im still weak from the flu.

Saturday, November 13, 2010

my counter tops are done! oh thank the gods! there finished!!!!! aaaaaaaaand i've got almost everything put back where it goes. and it's already a mess again!! yes, i'm excited! can't you tell by the exclamation marks???!!!?!??!??!!

here's the corner with the altar.

aren't they preeeeeeety?

all nice and shiny!

and aren't these curtains snazzy?

would i do it again? yes. totally worth it. give it a try. you won't be disappointed.

Friday, November 12, 2010

there will be people who wont want to read this. especially members of my immediate family who, knowing that this is an openion, will still state that its invalid. my only advice to you is... dont read it. then you cant get upset.

my day started out fairly usual. 5:20 alarm, 5:21 baby cring to be fed. but here's where it went wonkey. 5:30 a text message from my mother telling me that she's at the hospital with her mother, who is apparently hallucinating.

after making sure my mother was emotionally ok (as much as she could be) i showered and went about my day. up to now, there have been perodic calls to mom's cell phone to make sure shes still holding up.

and to be absolutly honest, thats all i care about. that mom is ok. about HER mother, it has to be said... i just dont care. you know the song from chorus line "i felt nothing"? thats me. it sounds crass, and cold, and... evil. but i dont. i just dont have it in me to care about a person who so obviously doesnt care about me.

for a multitude of reasons, that im not going to go into here (you really want to know, shoot me an email), the woman has never approved of me. not that she doesnt like me. she does not approve of my existance on this earthly plane. think im painting her too harshly? read on.

when we discovered that i am allergic to dates (which are just the most delish fruit EVAR and its totally unfair that theyll kill me(seriously theyll kill me)) everything in the thanksgiving meal was cooked with dates. everything. from cranberry sauce to dessert. even the salad had dates.

so weve always been on... eggshell like terms. at best.

but my mother and father raised me well, and raised me to be the bigger person. christmas cards were still sent. as well as thank you cards when it was approperate. but a couple of years ago i noticed something.

it was christmas, the in town family all together by the tree. gifts a plenty. and as they were passed out, a pattern emerged. gifts to and from nana and papa. gifts to and from me, hubby, and our daughter. gifts to her. wait. what?

apparently the day before shed screamed at my mother that the gifts that id been buying for her all these holidays were actually purchased by my mother, and that i was an ungreatfull curr. yes, curr. she also calls couches davenportts, but thats neither here nor there. she even had gifts under the tree to my sister and her family in south dakota. you know, to put a little salt on the wound.

its one thing to snub me. not my kids.

so my capacity for caring for this woman is just exhausted. i cant do it. and after all this time, i dont think i want to. but like i said, my parents raised me to be the bigger person. last week i took bubby up to see her. let her see what wonderful things shes missed in my life.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

*please forgive all spelling errors, im typing this on my kindle, and there is no spellcheck*

my kitchen is still in disarray. nothing is where it should be. the blender is on the floor, the microwave is sitting in front of the oven, the coffee maker on the stovetop. my altar people... in the panrty. my sacred space, my CENTER is jumbled and..... its just a big ole mess.

i mean, i knew that i wouldnt be able to use the countertops for three days. i mean, its written on the box. but knowing something, and having the reality slap you in the face are a bit different. 3 days of nothing on the counters. 3 days of no food prep that requires more than opening the fridge.

which means no real cooking. hells, no nukeing for that matter. no kitchen witchery. no whipping up a batch of witches brew, no steaming pots full of onion soup (onion for protection), no yummy smells coming froom the oven as i take out a batch of gingerbread bats. (yes, bats. one year for yule it was the only cookie cutter i had, now its a tradition.)

and thats bothering me a lot. that im not able to do my "witchery" at a moments notice. cooking and baking is such a huge aprt of who i am, of what i am. 3 days is a huge amount of time to be without that.

will it be worth it when the counter tops are done? i hope so. i know that it will be better when the countertops are done AND everything is back where it goes. when my "circle" is complete again.

Monday, November 8, 2010

i'm a cheapskate. i scour thrift stores. ebay is a resource beyond measure. craigslist is a gods send. so when it was oh so well past the time to replace the counter tops in the kitchen, i freaked.

the beginning estimates were at HUNDREDS of dollars. and that was just for cheap laminate. granite? in the thousands. concrete..... i didn't even ask. so i sucked it up. i told myself that the counters weren't that bad, that they would last. after all, they weren't falling apart, the were just stained and nasty. so when hubby and i were walking through the home improvement mega box store, we happened upon this little can of stuff called "counter paint". *insert angelic choir here*

at twenty bucks, it was a vast improvement over replacing the counters all together. so i figured why not. if it works, great, if it doesn't i'm only out a twenty. so we brought it home, and this morning, i tried it out.

IT WORKS!!! oh my gods it works! the color isn't exactly what i wanted (i was hoping for darker than it turned out), but it's a HELL of a lot cheaper! hurray for diy!!!

here are some before and after shots:

wide before shot

nasty stain 1

nasty stain 2

wide after shot

where nasty stain 1 used to be

﻿

it needs another coat, and like i said, i wish it was darker, but to be honest, i love my counters more now than i did this morning.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

yes, i gave myself permission to never step on the scale again. it was a bold move. one that has changed the world. um, yeah, not really. nobody outside of my little corner of the world (and yes, that does include you) gave a flying rats right butt cheek. and i'm ok with that, really.

and not stepping on the scale is freedom. scary, horrible, terrifying freedom. if i didn't have to weigh myself, there were no consequences. no consequences, then there is no reason not to have this cupcake. and that one. if there's nothing keeping me in check, i have no real reason to get on the treadmill. for a month. and so on, and so on.

and after a while, i started to notice that i wasn't feeling good. i started to feel like a human twinkie, stuffed with goo. ever felt like that? gross, huh?

i'd lost sight of why i started this experiment in the first place. to be happy with who i am. and i'm not happy feeling like i'm filled with artificially sweetened marshmallow fluff. i don't think i know anybody who would be. it's ooky.

so while i'm still not crazy about the scale, i'm going to keep better tabs on what goes into my body. not only what's in the food i'm eating, but how much of it i eat. and i'm getting back on the treadmill. i know i am more serious about my exercise if there's something i'm training FOR, so i'll be looking for a race here soon. (i'd like to do the warrior dash, but i don't think there's one close enough for me).